For the 21st time in the 25 years that Penn State has been eligible, the Nittany Lion football program has been recognized for graduation success by the American Football Coaches Association.

Penn State trails only Notre Dame and Virginia (each with 22) among Football Bowl Subdivision football programs in attaining this honor.

Penn State was among 17 colleges that earned special recognition from the AFCA for its graduation success. Iowa and Northwestern were the other Big Ten Conference schools on the list, which also included Boston College, Duke, Notre Dame, Rice and Stanford.

The AFCA citation recognizes schools for having a graduation rate of 75 percent or better for student-athletes who were freshmen during the 2004-05 academic year.

Footnotes, from Penn State:

-- Penn State and Stanford are tied for the top graduation success rate at 87 percent, among teams ranked in the Dec. 4 Bowl Championship Series and AP Top 25 rankings, according to data released in October by the NCAA.

-- Penn State has had 15 Academic All-Americans the past six years to lead the nation, with 13 first-team selections. The Nittany Lions' all-time total of 49 Academic All-America football players ranks third among all FBS institutions.

ALL-AMERICA TEAM NO. 10

Guess you can now say that Penn State defensive tackle Devon Still is a consensus All-American, as he has now picked up his 10th first-team honor, this time from The Sporting News.

i doubt this good news will be on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, even though a few weeks back, the WSJ published a front page story about Paterno interfering with University discipline for football players